


You've Got Time

by justanoutlaw



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Prison, F/F, Past Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-12 00:24:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18000275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justanoutlaw/pseuds/justanoutlaw
Summary: They say the first night is the hardest, but no passage of time makes prison easier.





	You've Got Time

**Author's Note:**

> Prompted by anonymous on CuriousCat: Prison AU - DragonQueen

Regina didn’t sleep. She had been told that the first night was the hardest, but as time went on, she found that every night was difficult. Sleeping on the top bunk, on a rock-hard mattress, staring up at the mildew encrusted ceiling was enough to remind her of why she was there.

 

Why she was likely to never leave. In fact, the only reason why she had been given minimum security was because her father had fought for it during the trial. Once she was sentenced, there was no doubt she’d be going to maximum.

 

She didn’t cry after the first night, tears meant feelings and feelings were weakness. At least that’s what Cora had told her every day growing up. Those words had been repeated the day she was forced to marry a man she didn’t love. It happened again when she tried to tell her mother that Leopold was beating her. Everyone knew what was going on, but no one said a word.  It went on for 5 years, until Regina simply couldn’t take it anymore. She began poisoning Leopold’s food, sure that she could get away with it, that everything would be over before she knew it.

 

If only they hadn’t done the autopsy. Since Regina was the one that prepared all of his foods, she was the one on trial. No one paid any attention to the bruises that lined her body or the eye witnesses she had lined up that heard him treat her horribly. Regina had married an affluent man, she was from a rich family herself. If things were so bad, she simply could’ve left.

 

A single tear fell down Regina’s face, followed by another as she remembered the night she had tried to leave. That had been the worst she had ever gotten and the night she realized what she had to do. No one listened to her, not even her own mother. That thought alone made her cry even harder. She brought her hand over her face, trying to stop the sobs, but it was too late.

 

Regina could hear someone climbing up the ladder to her bunk and in the hazy dark, she could make out one of her cellmates. Mallory Page, in for arson. She handed Regina a package of Kleenex, which Regina graciously accepted, blowing her nose.

 

“It doesn’t get easier, but you adjust to it,” Mallory told her. It was the most honest thing anyone had said since she arrived.

Regina sniffled, wiping at her face. “I’m scared.”

“I know you are.” Mallory took her hand. “But the thing about prison is, you’re never alone.”


End file.
